Fortress of Non-Solitude
by seriousish
Summary: Clark Kent didn't know what he expected when he traveled to the Arctic, to the last remnant of his dead homeworld, seeking answers. Just... not a nosy reporter.


Finding a crashed alien spaceship turned out to be pretty easy, once you know what you were looking for. After Lois noticed the pattern of anonymous Captain America acts around the globe, she just had to backtrack. Before her Starman-wannabe took his act on the road, he was localized to Kansas. As you went back, the strange occurrences got less and less widespread, until it was just a town called Smallville that had provided a doozy of tabloid headlines in the early nineties, but that was a dead-end. The trail was too cold.

But as far as she could tell, the weird started with a UFO sighting on September 3rd, 1987. On that same day, a meteorite had come down in the Arctic, only when the science boys went to put it in a museum, they only found a crater. Like the comet had wandered off.

Lois hated to call it women's intuition. It was journalistic instinct; a hunch. She knew something big was at the North Pole.

There wasn't much she could do about it from Metropolis, but Providence provided. She was given a story in the Yukon, and before the ink had dried she'd cashed in her vacation days to take a flight up to Alaska. There, she used her sick days to take a boat into the Arctic Circle. A few miles from the crash site, there was a confluence of glacier breakages, Aurora Borealis, and snowstorms that a few internet forums were convinced was Santa's workshop. You had to hand it to the crazies. They would usually be right if they weren't so crazy.

Now she was in the Arctic, driving through the snow on a one-hundred horsepower closed Snowcat. It wasn't so bad. There weren't any other drivers to worry about, so she could tune out and work on her novel. Plus, the Snowcat had a tape deck. With the nearest town three hundred miles away, there was no one to hear her listening to Katy Perry.

"Caesar grabbed his willful maiden. 'You may be my slave girl, but I am your slave.'," Lois dictated. Her speech-to-text app transcribed it. Boom. Nailed it.

She was just thinking up what to call Lowina's vagina—puckered love cave or beeless honey hive of sex?-when she saw it. Atop miles of featurelessly glazed terrain, there was a mountain made of crystal. It looked more like modern art than a building—in that she couldn't understand it. But unless there was a commune of ice sculpturists nearby, that was what she was looking for.

The closer she got, the more certain she was that it was hers. From a distance, you could mistake it for a weird glacier—global warming or something. Up close, it looked like a giant version of one of those toys the Rubik's Cube people put out that wasn't a Rubik's Cube. Rubik's Crystal or Rubik's Pyramid. And a blue glow, like low-hanging Northern Lights, pulsed through the ten-story prisms.

The Snowcat's electronics went on the fritz. Lois backed up while she still could and the interference cleared up. An EMP field, she theorized, to stymie detection. Looked like she would be going old-school on this. Lois reached into her pack and pulled out a pen, a notepad, and an old-fashioned 'you're gonna need a darkroom' camera. This was gonna be fun.

She forced the door and was instantly hit by how cold it was not to be sitting on a jury-rigged space heater. A brisk jog took her to the crystal whatever with toes to spare. Then, all she could do was rub her hands together.

The… foundation was covered in snow. Nothing so obvious as a doorknob. And this must've been the entrance. The crystals formed a kind of awning she hadn't spotted anywhere else. Maybe there was some kind of hidden switch. She cleared some of the snow away, teeth chattering. Five minutes later, she found what looked like someone's chiseled name in the crystal. The first letter was an S—was it? It looked a little weird, though that could've been the snow. She rubbed at it…

What looked like a solid hunk of crystal suddenly split in two, parting right through that off-kilter S. Snow surged into the opening, joining a thick layer of white that had already accumulated in the corridor inside. Someone had opened that very door recently. Note the footsteps in that carpet of snow.

Someone had gotten here before her. Who? Government spook? Invasion of the Body Snatchers? That one-in-a-million conspiracy nut who was dead-on? It could be any sort of dangerous person. How awesome was that?

So long as it wasn't anyone scooping her, of course.

Thank God—or whoever aliens worshipped—Lord Xenu, the place was warm. As warm as a tropical beach, even. Lois took off her coat. From the outside, the place had looked opaque. On the inside, the crystal was clear as air. She could see out all the way to the snowstorm battering the place. Deeper in, all the crystal started reflecting… something. A hall of mirror built for giants. Lois jotted down a few notes, took a picture, and chased her lead.

She walked deep into the fortress. The light—or lack thereof—from outside diminished, leaving the cascading blue light she had seen from outside. It made her feel like she was underwater, or on another planet. Up ahead, the corridor branched off. She turned left and nearly ran into a man's back.

Lois stifled a squeak and doubled back. Around the corner, though the corner was transparent, she couldn't see anyone. Lois quickly reached her hand around the corner and jerked it back. She hadn't seen it through the clear wall. That was impossible, which always made for a good headline.

The man poked his head around the corner. It was a nice head. Square jaw, strong cheekbones, just enough forehead. And eyes exactly like Jack had in her Titanic poster when she was thirteen. Oh yeah, she would love to do a spread on him.

"Who are you?" he demanded.

"That's all you've got?" she asked in return, and counted on her fingers. "Who are you, what is this place, what are you doing here, were you born on this planet, and why aren't you wearing a coat?" All five fingers extended, she offered her hand. "Lois Lane, Daily Planet."

He frowned. Man even had a cute frown. Like a puppy whose toy had been taken away. "Why would I be wearing a coat? It's warm in here. I took it off."

"That's one down, four to go."

"Is it considered rude to say 'no comment'?"

"A bit."

"No comment." He walked off. Lois followed. The nice view didn't make up for having to put down 'The possible alien declined to comment.'

He stopped in a few steps, realizing she was following him. They bumped together. He shook his head. "Look, I think you'd better leave. Whatever this place is, I doubt it belongs to you."

"Does it belong to you, Mr…"

"First name No, second name Comment."

"Really? Because on your driver's license it says Clark Kent."

Clark turned around. Lois had his wallet. She held it out to him. "You dropped this."

"Did you just pickpocket me?"

"Don't be ridiculous. I would never admit to that."

He snatched his wallet back, giving her a look that was mostly exasperation but a little bit awe. She liked that look. "Look, you seem like a nice lady and I'd love to give you a quote, but right now I'm doing something very important and I'm under a time constraint. So I would really appreciate it if you could annoy me at a later date."

"A rain check? Uh-uh, not happening. I've lost three boyfriends and a therapist that way. I want to know what's going on right now!"

It was then that Clark's pants started to glow.

"Oh, wow," Lois muttered. "I knew some men were into verbal abuse, but you don't seem like the type." And she should know. She'd lost four boyfriends that way.

He gave her a look as he reached into his pocket and brought out something long and white—"I'm flattered, really," Lois said, "but I think we should keep things professional until the story is published."—and it was a crystal. A glowing, pulsing crystal.

"_That _can wait until a second date, toy-boy."

He gave her a grumpy cat face. "Do you just assume that everyone you meet wants to have sex with you?"

She shrugged. "It saves time."

Then the crystal/maybe-dildo started talking. "Kal-El, it is imperative that—" Clark shoved it back in his pants.

Lois's eyebrows were raised. "Your dildo's talking."

"It's a phone."

"It called you Kal-El."

"Old football nickname."

"Don't you just have an answer to everything."

"Forty-two." Clark patted his (glowing) pocket. "I gotta take this."

Lois replied instantly. "I promise I won't eavesdrop, just overhear."

Clark stalked off, holding the crystal in front of himself like a torch. His long legs carried him so far that Lois was hard-pressed to keep up. She caught snippets of conversation drifting back, but they were quiet and mystifying. Nothing she would swear to in front of Perry White.

Clark unhesitantly swerved through the labyrinth. Lois mirrored all his turns. Maybe his dildo-phone had GPS. Finally, he came to a wall of faceted diamond. He stared at it with the aggravation she'd brought out in him. Lois felt a little sorry for putting him in a bad mood. He probably had a great smile.

It occurred to Lois that she hadn't 'done a piece' since one of the verbal abuse boys.

"No key under the welcome mat," Lois offered.

"The crystal's supposed to open it… somehow… I think." Clark's linebacker body was knotted up in consternation. The big guy was a touch neurotic. Why did she find that adorable? "Maybe you should head back to Metropolis. This could take a while."

"Ho'wd you know I live in Metropolis?"

"Where else would a Daily Planet reporter live?" He was tapping the crystal against his lips in thought. She really hoped it wasn't a dildo. "I've read your work. It's good."

"Good." She said it like it was a hate word for journalists. "I won the Metro Award three years in a row!"

"It was a weak field." He glanced at her. "The other frontrunner was a New York Times expose on Jay-Z's trip to Cuba."

"You're a journalist."

"Something like that."

"A blogger?"

He turned his attention back to the wall.

"I meant that in a nice way."

Clark was staring at the wall like he could see through it, though the stuff was pebbled like the world's thickest shower door.

"Maybe if I…" Clark tapped the crystal against the wall. Nothing happened. "Or if…" He tapped the crystal against a different part of the wall and nothing happened. "But what if…" He turned the crystal around and tapped it.

"Are you trying to make fire, by any chance?"

"Do you wanna try?"

"Yes."

"…too bad."

"Because there's another of those funny Ses right there."

"I see it. That's what I was tapping."

"And there's another on the crystal. Like the Nike swoosh."

"It's not a logo."

"The transparent crystal, Clark."

"So?"

"So maybe if you held it up to the light so the logo beamed onto the other logo, it'd open."

"That's not going to—" It worked.

"I played a lot of adventure games as a kid," Lois said smugly.

Stepping inside, Lois groaned inwardly. It was a big round room. Her readers would hate that kind of cliché. But on a second look, what'd she taken for projections from the walls were actually shards of crystal hanging in mid-air, like ice in water. On a closer look, the crystals didn't look like shards at all. They were too structured for that. More like letters in a foreign language. And depending on where she stood, the foreground crystals and background overlapped to form new shapes, like two transparencies laid on a projector.

"I'll never get modern art," Lois said. She looked at Clark, who was gawking in a John Wayne sort of way. "This better not be meant to represent gender identity or something."

"What, you think this is all my art project?"

"Yes, it's stupid. Stupid is more plausible than aliens."

After a moment, Clark nodded softly. "So I built an art project in the middle of the Arctic Circle."

Years of interviewing politicians and pop stars kept her from laughing when something ridiculous was said. "Uh-huh. With what money?"

"I got a grant." One of the crystals hovered by Clark's head. "And won the lotto."

"And," Lois continued with a smile, "what does all this represent?"

"War."

"Oh?"

"It's bad."

It was amazing how dumb people thought she could be (she tried not to take it personally). Lois folded her arms. "You're not too into women, are you?"

"I… like women very much. As have many artists."

"And yet you haven't figured out we, as a gender, can _smell your lies_. It's just that sometimes we want to get laid too, even if that makes two people pretending you're an airline pilot."

"I'm… not a pilot," Clark said, confused.

"And you're not an artist either. For Christ's sake, do you even have an opinion on Apple?"

"I," Clark paused, "suppose they make good products."

"You're not an artist!" Lois insisted, nearly seething.

"I like iTunes!"

"Name four flavors at Starbucks."

"Well, there's… coffee… Look, if I'm not an artist, what am I?"

The crystals lit up. Light ran over them in lines, but continued over the borders of the crystals to form a framework mask. A face.

"I take it back," Lois said. "You're a great artist."

The giant face spoke. In English, with a strange accent. Like, New Zealand. "Greetings, Kal-El. My son. I am Jor-El and though I could not raise you, I am your father."

"Pause," said Clark.

"I know you must have questions. By now, you will have learned that you have power far beyond that of mortal man—at least, beyond those of your adopted world."

"Stop!" Clark said more frantically.

"You were born eons ago on a world light-years away and long dead. The planet Krypton, in its lonely orbit around a red sun."

"Rewind?" Clark tried. The recording ignored him. As it went on, Clark backed against the wall and slid down onto his ass.

Lois took notes.

When Jor-El was done, she said "I suppose you didn't want me to hear that."

"Not particularly," he moaned through the hands covering his face.

"I'm going to assume that's because I'm a reporter and not anything personal."

"Oh, no, you're lovely. I'm sure you'll hug a kitten to celebrate writing my expose." Clark began banging his head against the wall. The wall shook slightly.

"Well, actually, if you were my source, I'd be obliged not to give up any personal details about you. I'd go to jail first."

"I don't understand. Don't you want to expose me?"

Lois's eyebrows peaked. "Not in the press. It sounds like your life's about to get very interesting; evil aliens, good aliens, you doing the Batman thing. Me having the inside scoop would be good for both of us. Besides, who would believe Clark Kent is a member of an advanced alien race? You're wearing flannel."

They shook on it. When she offered her hand, he stared at it like he really was an alien. Then Clark just... flew off to save the world.

Aliens invaded and another alien fought them off. It was the news story of the century, or any other century, and while every journalist on the could stick his head out the window and have an eyewitness account of alien life, Lois was in a Snowcat headed for Anchorage, doing her nails.

Which meant Perry got to yell at her, which he relished. He couldn't very well chew her out for going into a senator's mansion dressed as a stripper when she got a scoop about North Korean money going into campaign funds. But she took every shouted word with dry nails. This was way bigger than a headline. It could be a book deal.

As soon as the airlines weren't grounded, she was on a flight to Smallville. There was a woman there who'd struck her as particularly canny when she was making the rounds—Martha Kent, just like Clark Kent.

As she'd expected, she found him on the Kent farm. Unexpectedly, he was doing nothing more mysterious than tossing bales of hay.

"I'd ask if you need a hand..." she said, approaching casually, hands in her pockets. "I'd hate to seem facetious though."

He asked how she'd found him and she told him, stressing that she wouldn't bother his parents. He shook his head.

"It's fine. They'd probably love to know I met a girl." Then he went wide-eyed apologetic at the insinuation. She laughed.

"So," she began, with the smile that brought down Fortune 500 companies, "alien invasion. Wanna talk about it?"

"One condition: try my mom's roast. She'll never forgive me if I have a guest over and don't let her feed them."

"It's been a long time since I had a home-cooked meal," she agreed.

In a blur, the bales were all where they needed to be. Brushing his hands off, he led her toward the house.

"One more thing," he said, stopping halfway there. She braced herself for the threat. She'd heard them all, but maybe an alien would have something new. "Keep my secret. Please."

"Or I'll end up on the moon without a spacesuit?" she teased.

And regretted it, because he suddenly looked ill. "No! Of course not! You could write that I... ate _babies _and all I'd do is stop talking to you. I just wanted to ask you—nicely—that you not do that to me and the people I care about."

She reached out and took his big hand, trying to reassure him. "I don't want you to stop talking to me."

"Alright then." His smile looked like it could do a number on Wall Street itself. "Let's get you fed. And how'd you like the costume, by the way."

"The costume?" she asked his back.

"Yeah." He stopped in the doorway. "I didn't look silly, did I?"

"No, you looked great." He got the door for her. She shook her head as she went in. God save her from farmboys. "We need to get rid of those red undies, though."

"I beg your pardon!" Martha Kent yelped.


End file.
